When Stranger Things returns for its fourth season on May 27, audiences are going to be amazed by just how much the Hawkins kids have grown up since we last saw them. All those baby faces are gone, and the goings-on in the new season reflect that overall maturity. In particular, the ladies of the cast continue to step up with their proactive selves, whether it's figuring out what’s truly at the heart of the “Hawkins curse,” helping save the people they love, or in the case of Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), figuring out who she is without her powers.
Now a high school student in California, El starts the season with new villainy to thwart in the form of mean girls who love to humiliate her at every opportunity. It’s certainly a much smaller scale threat, but not when it comes to how devastating it is to El’s extremely fragile self-esteem and the pain she still carries regarding the loss of Hopper (David Harbour).
“I love that storyline,” Brown enthuses to IGN. “The fact that we took something that defined her so much throughout the whole story of Stranger Things, the most precious thing that protected and shielded her from danger, and saw what she really was faced with. Which are the real dangers of bullying, which are the dangers of bad influences, which are the dangers of words. Things like that, they're really scary and they're very real. And it's something that people deal with on a day to day basis. It was kind of nice to be able to take something like that away from her and throw her something that was a bit more challenging, which was real world problems.”
Back in Hawkins, the real world problems are just as present for Max (Sadie Sink) who has been profoundly changed in the wake of Billy’s (Dacre Montgomery) death last season. She opens the season more withdrawn and seething internally about her part in all of it.
“When we see her in Season 4, it's almost like she's just kind of given up in a way and gone as far as to completely shut herself off from all of her friends,” Sink tells IGN. “With Billy, it's a tricky dynamic, because it wasn't like the two were necessarily close or anything. But that was still her brother and his death really shook up her whole life. And then the feelings and thoughts that she had after that.”
Sink says so much of Max’s journey this season is relatable to kids who have lost family or friends, and wondering why they’re still alive. “She’s thinking that maybe it wasn't all his fault and maybe I could have done something to prevent it?” the actress says. “All those dark and irrational thoughts that just eat away at a person when something traumatic like this happens.”
In the cases of Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and Robin (Maya Hawke), their prior commonality has always just been Steve (Joe Keery). But in Season 4, that connection helps the two very self-sufficient teens find their own friendship, and admiration of one another.
“Robin and Nancy on paper are so wildly different characters, in a way,” Dyer assesses to IGN. “They're both intelligent, strong female characters and that cuts through everything. There's a strong mutual respect. Nancy has her methodology and she's pretty straightforward with logic. Robin is such an out of the box thinker. That kind of helps. I think for Nancy it's such a different perspective, that is really helpful and new.”
Hawke adds, “Robin really admires Nancy's ability to watch out for other people. And that powerful generosity of spirit and love, and also this kind of grace. I feel like Robin is going through a period of insecurity, or interest about what are the different ways? Like, how does Nancy do it? How does she do it all and make it look so easy?”
The actress says Robin’s curiosity about Nancy in turn reveals that even the most put together people on the surface might feel exactly like she does inside. “Robin starts to understand that it isn't all as easy as it looks,” she says. “There's positives from both things, and they both have a lot to learn from each other. It gets more confident through that relationship.”
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Now a high school student in California, El starts the season with new villainy to thwart in the form of mean girls who love to humiliate her at every opportunity. It’s certainly a much smaller scale threat, but not when it comes to how devastating it is to El’s extremely fragile self-esteem and the pain she still carries regarding the loss of Hopper (David Harbour).
“I love that storyline,” Brown enthuses to IGN. “The fact that we took something that defined her so much throughout the whole story of Stranger Things, the most precious thing that protected and shielded her from danger, and saw what she really was faced with. Which are the real dangers of bullying, which are the dangers of bad influences, which are the dangers of words. Things like that, they're really scary and they're very real. And it's something that people deal with on a day to day basis. It was kind of nice to be able to take something like that away from her and throw her something that was a bit more challenging, which was real world problems.”
Back in Hawkins, the real world problems are just as present for Max (Sadie Sink) who has been profoundly changed in the wake of Billy’s (Dacre Montgomery) death last season. She opens the season more withdrawn and seething internally about her part in all of it.
“When we see her in Season 4, it's almost like she's just kind of given up in a way and gone as far as to completely shut herself off from all of her friends,” Sink tells IGN. “With Billy, it's a tricky dynamic, because it wasn't like the two were necessarily close or anything. But that was still her brother and his death really shook up her whole life. And then the feelings and thoughts that she had after that.”
Sink says so much of Max’s journey this season is relatable to kids who have lost family or friends, and wondering why they’re still alive. “She’s thinking that maybe it wasn't all his fault and maybe I could have done something to prevent it?” the actress says. “All those dark and irrational thoughts that just eat away at a person when something traumatic like this happens.”
In the cases of Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and Robin (Maya Hawke), their prior commonality has always just been Steve (Joe Keery). But in Season 4, that connection helps the two very self-sufficient teens find their own friendship, and admiration of one another.
“Robin and Nancy on paper are so wildly different characters, in a way,” Dyer assesses to IGN. “They're both intelligent, strong female characters and that cuts through everything. There's a strong mutual respect. Nancy has her methodology and she's pretty straightforward with logic. Robin is such an out of the box thinker. That kind of helps. I think for Nancy it's such a different perspective, that is really helpful and new.”
Hawke adds, “Robin really admires Nancy's ability to watch out for other people. And that powerful generosity of spirit and love, and also this kind of grace. I feel like Robin is going through a period of insecurity, or interest about what are the different ways? Like, how does Nancy do it? How does she do it all and make it look so easy?”
The actress says Robin’s curiosity about Nancy in turn reveals that even the most put together people on the surface might feel exactly like she does inside. “Robin starts to understand that it isn't all as easy as it looks,” she says. “There's positives from both things, and they both have a lot to learn from each other. It gets more confident through that relationship.”
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